


The Love You Make

by bookjunkiecat



Series: Glimpses of the Heart [5]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Intimacy, Love, M/M, Retirement
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-15
Updated: 2018-02-15
Packaged: 2019-03-19 02:55:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13695417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookjunkiecat/pseuds/bookjunkiecat
Summary: Nearing their seventies, Mycroft and Greg have retired to Lilac House and forged a lovely life for themselves. Mycroft is happy with their intimacy, but he wonders if it's an indication that something is missing because they haven't actually made love in ages.





	The Love You Make

**MINISTER OF TRANSPORT UNMASKED IN SEX SCANDAL** read the headline. No doubt it wasn’t particularly scandalous, but the media always had delighted in raking up trouble in the government. Thank heavens his days of smoothing said problems was over. Retirement was blessedly filled with books, walks, cookery classes, attempts at not murdering the garden, and his husband.

   But… it had been ages since they last had sex. Mycroft wasn’t entirely certain that it hadn’t been since shortly after Christmas when they last took one another apart. Once the thought would have made him sad- did it make him sad still? Or was he feeling as if he _should_ feel sad over that fact? To be precise- and he adored precision- for many years the idea of a life with no sex, no relationships, wouldn’t have bothered him at all. It was easier, cleaner. No emotions or entanglements. No pressure points or obligations. And then shortly after his forty-second birthday, what had once been a pleasant working relationship and an at times slightly friendly acquaintance had begun to alter. By the time Mycroft celebrated his forty-fifth birthday, he celebrated it (in style and with a good deal of athletic and sweaty sex) with Greg Lestrade, his boyfriend of three years.

   Their union was passionate, at times distractingly so, and everything he had never wanted nor thought he needed. Although, he had come to realize, and as Greg so fondly pointed out, he was a bit of an idiot. Love and sex and all the messy, heartfelt emotions that came with them had invaded his life most spectacularly. But the late night assignations and early morning quickies, the candlelight dinners, stolen weekends and turbulent fights followed by incendiary sex were rather a thing of the past. They’d been married for almost twenty years now, they were approaching seventy…it wasn’t unusual that he couldn’t recall the last time they’d had sex. Surely it wasn’t unusual…was it? Didn’t all couples end this way, eventually? His love for Greg hadn’t cooled, even if his ardor had.

   “Do you miss it?” Mycroft asked suddenly, looking up from his morning paper (never mind technology, he still preferred broadsheets). He admired the way the sun gilded his husband’s still abundant silver hair, and highlighted the rugged lines of past smiles.

   Greg, in the middle of pouring himself more coffee, paused, “Are you having another conversation with yourself that you forgot to include me in or are you referring to something in particular, beautiful?”

   Still, after all these years, he called him _beautiful_. Mycroft blinked away entirely uncharacteristic moisture from his (still perfectly reliable thank you very much) eyes, and put down his paper, leaning on the small table in the breakfast nook. It had been a rather disreputable looking piece of abandoned furniture his husband found in the barn when they moved into Lilac House, but with Greg’s patience and skill it had shaped up into a perfectly suitable table. It was rather a trait of his, Mycroft reflected foolishly, taking things no one else wanted and giving them a new life. “I love you,” he said impulsively, warmly, forgetting to answer Greg’s query.

   The same look of warm happiness entered Greg’s eyes as had always done, “I love you too, Myke.” One still-strong hand covered his on the table, clasped amongst the clutter of breakfast things, thumb rubbing over his knuckles. “After you finish the paper I was thinking we could go for a walk? Perhaps over to Windermeyer’s farm…the orchard is in bloom.” He smiled boyishly, “I’d like to kiss you under the apple blossoms.”

   Winding his fingers through Greg’s, Mycroft leaned over the table, heart swelling happily, “You’re a romantic old fool, you know that?”

   “It’s all your fault,” Greg assured him with a smile that promised achingly lovely kisses and embraces whose ardor had never faded, though they had become everyday, “Something about you brings out the hopeless romantic in me.” He stirred sugar unto his coffee, brown eyes bright, “And we can pick up some apples… I’d like to make more of those tarts you love so much.”

   Perhaps the length of time between lovemaking didn’t matter, Mycroft realized, leaving back in his chair and reaching for his paper. Not as long as they kept loving.


End file.
